The Peoples’ Records

The basic philosophy of this site is that a Government not accountable to the public will run amok. Funds will be misspent, bad behavior will be covered up, and cronies will be rewarded. Ohio’s Public Records Statute provides a strong tool for citizen oversight, but it is underused. The statute provides the successful citizen with a chance to recover attorney’s fees spent in pursuit of public records and a $1000.00 penalty for each record destroyed improperly. These incentives led to the $983,000.00 settlement in Kish v. City of Akron in early 2007, a $90,000.00 settlement in Kelley v. Mogadore, and many other smaller settlements statewide.